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You certainly already know there are “good carbs” and “bad carbs”. This post is about understanding both how to recognize them thoroughly, and what makes the good ones good, and the bad ones bad.

Previous posts have given some insight on this already, as well as the free weight loss plan itself, but if you didn’t read them, you didn’t know that. If you did, it’s not all there, and this is the foundation of the plan (that made me lose 60 lbs).

There are four characteristics of carbohydrates: Glycemic index, insulinic index, calorie load and metabolism (or your body’s cells ability to metabolize them).

Glycemic index.

This defines the time a carbohydrate takes to get to the bloodstream after ingestion. If it is fast, the glycemic index is high.

Good carbohydrates have a low glycemic index.

The reason this makes them good carbohydrates is that high glycemic index means you get a sudden glycemic hit that causes the pancreas to react violently. This means a peak of insulin, which causes the sugar to be stored quickly, which causes a sugar low and a craving for more sugar.

This leads to addiction, followed by an immunization to insulin called resistance to insulin, which is the first real step towards diabetes.

Insulinic index.

This defines how strongly the pancreas reacts to the carbohydrate. Even if it hits the blood gradually, a low GI carbohydrate with very high insulinic index will cause the same pancreatic response we are trying to avoid.

Although low GI tends to mean low insulinic index, there are a couple exceptions: milk and diet soda (hence the drink water only part of the weight loss plan).

Sugar substitutes in diet soda have no calories, because they cannot be metabolized by the cells. Nonetheless, their structure is close enough to sugar to be recognized as such, and trigger an insulin peak.

Calorie load.

The most important rule for weight loss is burning more calories than you absorb. Very few calories escape the body, so they are either burned or stored (the only ones that are filtered out are proteins, partially eliminated by the kidneys).

Low GI foods can therefore be a poor source of carbohydrates, simply because they contain too many calories (almonds and nuts for example, with roughly 600 calories to 100 grams).

Metabolism.

One carbohydrate in particular cannot be metabolized by all the cells in the body: fructose. There is a very interesting video about this in a previous post, see it when you can if you haven’t yet!

Fructose can only be metabolized by the liver, which leads to the creation of “bad cholesterol”, or Low Density Lipoprotein (LDL). Low density is what makes it dangerous – it can penetrate vascular walls, thicken and harden them, which ultimately causes the cardio-vascular disease everyone knows about.

This doesn’t mean fruit should necessarily be avoided, as long as it has a low GI, because fructose intake from fruit represents about 15 grams a day, whereas the dangers for public health come from current consumption having topped 100 grams a day. Fructose is used as a sugar (and fat) substitute just about in every manufactured food.

Digestability.

Carbohydrates that cannot be digested are commonly called fiber. There are three types of fiber that I will cover extensively in a later post.

All three types are necessary to maintain good digestion, which prevents toxic build-up.

All of this led to most of the weight loss plan rules. It works, so if you have a few lbs to lose, or many, follow it! You will live lighter and longer!

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